Video is becoming the dominant form of content consumption. Cisco’s Visual Networking Index (VNI) found video to be 85% of internet traffic now. Apart from videos being more engaging, it also brings in video advertising revenue. More than half of BuzzFeed’s advertising revenue comes from video ads, it is expected to reach 75% in a few years. Similarly, The Washington Post, Forbes, and CBS, have begun exploring video advertising channels and video ad networks.
One of the most popular video monetization platforms for publishers is YouTube.
DailyMotion is another popular video platform. However these platforms take a significant cut, YouTube takes 45% of the revenue leaving publishers with only 55% of total revenue.
In this article, we will cover how bloggers and news publishers can generate revenue using video monetization platforms.
There are two ways of monetizing using video ads; Instream Video ads and Outstream Video ads.
Instream videos ads appear in the video player either before, during, or after the video content. These ads offer good viewability and engagement. Outstream video ads appear outside the video player, either on the webpage or the sidebar, or in the editorial content itself. These type of ads are less intrusive compared to instream ads.
There are four main types of instream video ads:
Ad Type |
Description |
Pre-roll ads |
Most common type of instream ad, displayed before video playback, are skippable. |
Mid-roll ads |
These ads are played in between the video content. One of the most effective to engage users. |
Post-roll ads |
Displayed at the end of the video these ads can be a good way to reinforce the message of the ad. |
Bumper ads |
These are short, non-skippable ads, typically 6 seconds or less. Primarily used on shorter videos. |
There are three main types of outstream video ads:
Ad Type |
Description (All these ads can be either static or animated) |
In-page ads |
Displayed on the same page as the video content. |
In-banner ads |
Displayed in banners on the page. |
In-content ads |
Displayed within the content of the page. |
These ads are displayed over the video player. They are typically non-skippable and do not obstruct the video content.
These ads are displayed alongside the video content. They do not obstruct the video content in any way.
Client-side ad insertion: The most common type of ad insertion, ads are inserted into the video player on the user's device. Ads are loaded and played by the user's device, and the video platform isn’t involved.
Pros:
Cons:
Server-side ad insertion: In server-side ad insertion, the ads are inserted into the video player by the video platform, and the user's device isn’t involved.
Pros:
Cons:
There are certain factors that publishers should keep in mind when choosing a platform for generating revenue through video monetization-
Brightcove Video Cloud is a cloud-based video hosting and publishing platform that makes it easy to create, manage, and deliver video content to your audience. It is a leading video platform that offers a variety of features for news publishers, including ad insertion, video analytics, and video player customization.
Top Features
Pricing
Plan |
Storage |
Video Plays per Month |
Per-Video Play Fee |
Prices Start |
Starter |
100GB |
100,000 |
$0.01 |
$199/month |
Essentials |
1TB |
1 million |
$0.00 |
$999/month |
Advanced |
Unlimited |
Unlimited |
$0.00 |
$4,999/month |
Custom |
Contact for Pricing |
Aniview is a video advertising and monetization platform that delivers customized solutions to publishers and ad networks across the web and mobile. Aniview's patented video player technology ensures smooth video delivery to over 200,000 publishers worldwide, including many of the world's largest web publishing groups.
Aniview's high-performance ad server and video marketplace offer access to a wide range of advertisers and ad formats.
Top features
Pricing
Contact for Pricing.
Ezoic Humix is a video management platform that allows publishers to host, share, and embed videos on their websites. Humix also allows publishers to configure each video's settings, choose where those videos are displayed, measure user performance, and track revenue. This information can be used to optimize video campaigns and improve ad revenue.
Top Features:
Pricing
Ezoic bundles Humix with its other offerings such as Flickify and NicheIQ. It offers a free trial for all products and features for 30 days. There are two paid plans,
Ezoic Standard: 10% revenue share
Ezoic Premium: For Current Customers Only, Level 2+
Recently acquired by JW Player, InPlayer is a top video content monetization platform that helps video creators make money from their content. It offers tools for both pay-per-view and subscription-based revenue models.
With InPlayer, you get a bunch of useful features. You can use coupons to give discounts, block viewers from specific regions, and let people pay in different currencies. Viewers can also pay by sharing on social media, like giving a "like" or tweeting about it helping distribution.
InPlayer gives you access to their API for easy integration. They also have a built-in system to help track viewers and their information.
Top Features
Pricing
Contact for Pricing.
Cincopa is a video monetization platform that specializes in short-form videos. Cincopa's platform can be integrated with any website and CMS, it also has plugins for WordPress, Joomla and Drupal making it easy for publishers to implement. It is a cloud-based multimedia solution that can help media publishers create, manage, and deliver videos and other media assets more effectively.
Plan |
Monthly Price |
Features |
Plus |
$25 |
|
Corporate |
$99 |
|
Enterprise |
$350 |
|
A comprehensive live streaming platform that offers a variety of features for businesses and organizations, including custom branding, analytics tracking, and password-protected streams. It also offers live chat, Q&A, polls, recording, and live streaming to social media.
Pricing
Vimeo Livestream offers a free trial and paid plans start at \$65 per month/seat billed yearly.
Primis is a video discovery engine platform that helps publishers increase revenue by recommending high-quality video content to their users.
Primis' technology is used by hundreds of digital publishers worldwide. Every month, Primis makes over 4.8 billion recommendations of 3.4 million pieces of content across 30 verticals. This results in the monetization of over 4.5 billion video impressions.
Pricing
Contact for Pricing.
VDO.AI provides video advertising solutions for publishers and advertisers. It offers a variety of tools and services that help publishers monetize their content, including a video player, ad server, and programmatic advertising platform. However, VDO.AI prefers to work only with websites that are already generating at least $4,000 in monthly ad revenue.
Publishers can leverage VDO.AI to monetize their video content through a variety of ad formats, including pre-roll, mid-roll, and post-roll ads.
Advertising is a major source of revenue for media publishers and they can maximize their earnings by ensuring their ads are seen by the right people.
For small publishers with a limited budget, platforms like YouTube, DailyMotion, and Vimeo offer free or low-cost plans to start video monetization. The aforementioned platforms demand a considerable chunk of the ad revenue which isn’t ideal for publishers with significant traffic.
Publishers with over 1M visitors a month getting significant playbacks on their website should consider moving to an ad-based video monetization platform. Since the revenue share model is relaxed, publishers will be able to retain a significant chunk of their revenue.
For larger enterprise-level publishers with over 10M visitors a month, it is essential to opt for a platform that offers on a fixed fee model instead of a revenue share model. Platforms such as Uscreen or Brightcove offer more features and customization options and will prove to be more value for money as the video views climb up.
Once you have chosen a video monetization platform, you can start creating and monetizing your videos. With the right platform, you can turn your videos into a profitable business.
If you’re a publisher wanting to generate more revenue, you can also try push notification monetization and exit-intent recommendations.